SPOILS GO TO VICTOR

The power elite among jockeys at Hollywood Park and Santa Anita is a tight club. Since 1970, only 11 riders have won titles in the long-running major meets at those tracks. That’s 61 titles, and even the casual fan could name most of the jockeys who won them. You start with Laffit Pincay and his 25 titles--and work down.

But there’s a new face--and a new head of hair--at Hollywood Park, and if Victor Espinoza continues at the same pace he has set since late April, he’ll crash this exclusive lodge.

Espinoza, his hair dyed a rusty gold to match the name of the race, won the $1-million Sempra Energy Hollywood Gold Cup on Sunday. He stuck around for another stakes victory in the $300,000 Triple Bend Breeders’ Cup Handicap and now, going into the final 11 days of the meet, holds a six-victory lead, 49-43, over Corey Nakatani, a three-time winner of major meets at Hollywood and Santa Anita.

If anyone saw Espinoza’s success coming, it was Vince DeGregory, the veteran jockey agent who was in a bittersweet position Sunday when the 28-year-old Espinoza booted home Early Pioneer at 24-1 odds in the Gold Cup and Elaborate at 10-1 in the Triple Bend.

In 1996, DeGregory was Espinoza’s first agent in Southern California, until Tony Matos replaced him about two years ago. In fact, one of DeGregory’s current clients, Matt Garcia, had been riding Early Pioneer well before trainer Vladimir Cerin, opting for the hot rider and a jockey who might be a better fit, chose Espinoza for the Gold Cup. When Matos left Southern California a few days before the Gold Cup to visit his ailing mother in Puerto Rico, he drafted DeGregory as his temporary replacement.

On Monday, DeGregory riffled through his files and produced a magazine article written shortly after Espinoza had been the leading rider at the 1996 Los Angeles County Fair at Fairplex Park in Pomona. Espinoza won 23 races in 19 days, and he returned the next year to win 24 and another meet title.

“I said in the article that Victor was more advanced a rider than Laffit was at the same age,” said DeGregory, who was Pincay’s agent for about six years in the 1970s, when they had a stranglehold on virtually all the titles at Hollywood and Santa Anita. “I predicted that in a couple of years, Victor would be in the top five in the standings around here.”

With a strong finish at the Santa Anita meet that ended on April 24, Espinoza totaled 62 victories, which placed him third in the standings, behind Nakatani and Kent Desormeaux. That success carried over to Hollywood Park, where he has won 19% of his mounts--a high percentage--in securing the support of many of the most important trainers on the grounds. His six stakes victories at the meet have been for different trainers.

“He’s very athletic, and he’s an excellent judge of pace,” Cerin said. “He’s very good at seeing holes and then moving a horse through.”

Cerin had been aware of Espinoza when the jockey was a leading apprentice at Bay Meadows and Golden Gate Fields in 1993-94.

“I knew he was up there, but I never paid much attention to him,” Cerin said. “I thought he was just an ordinary rider. He was a transplant from Northern California, and I thought that maybe he should have stayed there.”

Recently, though, with Espinoza piling up victories, Cerin began to notice, and he was particularly impressed by a ride Espinoza gave a horse at Hollywood Park.

“My wife Kellie was with me,” Cerin said. “She’s an excellent horsewoman, so I wanted her to see him ride. Victor put on a remarkable show of riding ability. The kid is just phenomenal, and I’m very happy to have him. I think he’s tremendous.”

Espinoza left Northern California early in 1996 to ride in Kentucky, where the winter chill and a lack of business conspired against him. He lasted only three weeks.

“He was just walking around back there,” DeGregory said.

On the phone with DeGregory, Espinoza said he wanted to try Southern California.

“I’ll be there tomorrow,” Espinoza said to DeGregory.

“Wait a minute,” DeGregory said, “I don’t have any horses for you to ride yet.”

“That’s OK,” Espinoza said. “It’s too cold for me to stay here.”

DeGregory said trainers on the major circuit were attracted to Espinoza after his twin titles at Fairplex.

“The kid rode the hell out of that bullring,” DeGregory said. “He was in with riders like [David] Flores and [Martin] Pedroza, and he held his own. The big outfits aren’t there, but Mel Stute was there--he was the leading trainer--and his barn and others began to give Victor a lot of business. The thing I like about the kid is that while he works hard, he still has a happy-go-lucky attitude. He never gets mad at anybody.”

This is Espinoza’s ex-agent talking.

Said his current agent Matos, who also books mounts for Kent Desormeaux and had a long-time association with Pincay, “Victor’s very talented, and he’s at the peak of his form now. He’s always been a good rider, but he never got the opportunity with the bigger stables.”

Espinoza, who is 5 feet 2 and 112 pounds, had no plans to become a jockey out of high school, and worked for a Mexico City bus company, as a driver’s assistant, for more than a year. One of 12 children, he had a brother who trained quarter horses and began working around his barn. (Another brother, Jose, rides in New York.) Victor learned to ride at a farm, then moved on to thoroughbreds, finding them more exciting than quarter horses. He was 20 when he won with the first mount he ever had, at Hipodromo de las Americas in Mexico City in December 1992.

Espinoza has won 114 races this year. He climbed to ninth among jockeys nationally in money earned after the Gold Cup Day bonanza rocketed his total past $5.6 million.

“I never had a day like that,” Espinoza said. “After Santa Anita this year, I said to myself that I was capable of winning more. I knew being with [Matos], I had one of the best [agents] in the business. Then when you get picked to ride a horse like Early Pioneer, it helps your confidence. I don’t necessarily want to be the best, but I’d like to get near the top. I don’t want to be famous, but I’d like to win as much as I can. You see some jockeys do good, then they disappear.”

In Espinoza’s first Breeders’ Cup race, he finished eighth last year with Kirkwall in the Mile at Gulfstream Park. A month before, he and Kirkwall had won the $400,000 Keeneland Turf Mile, which was his richest victory before the Gold Cup.

In May-- in his first Triple Crown assignment-- he rode longshot Hugh Hefner in the Preakness, leading for six furlongs beforefading to a sixth-place finish.

“It’s not easy being a jockey,” Espinoza said. “It’s hard physically, and it’s very hard mentally. The jockeys here [in Southern California] are the best--many of them are near the top [nationally]. But I looked at a jockey like Gary Stevens once and I said to myself, ‘I can do the same thing. If I ride hard, I can be like him.’ ”

More and more, that seems to be the case.

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Espinoza By The Numbers

49 Victories at Hollywood Park meeting, which ranks first among jockeys with 11 dates left

114 Victories overall in 2000

19 Percentage of victories in 609 mounts in 2000--a career best in eight years as a jockey

$5,637,040 Purse money earned in 2000, which ranks ninth nationally

NATIONAL LEADERS

For 2000 through July 9. Based on purse money earned.

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Jockey Mounts 1st 2nd 3rd Money Pat Day 688 147 112 122 $8,898,392 Corey Nakatani 568 128 103 77 $8,794,403 Kent Desormeaux 493 101 73 77 $8,226,542 Shane Sellers 635 105 94 78 $7,286,853 Jorge Chavez 801 153 121 94 $7,247,619 Jerry Bailey 468 130 80 64 $6,952,782 Robby Albarado 888 177 134 147 $6,533,459 Edgar Prado 883 140 141 139 $5,985,120 Victor Espinoza 609 114 93 88 $5,637,040 John Velazquez 685 111 119 79 $5,488,316

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Statistics provided by Associated Press

YEAR-BY-YEAR

Victor Espinoza’s key statistics in each of his eight years as a jockey. 2000 statistics through July 9.

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Year Mounts 1st 2nd 3rd Win% Money 1993 116 11 11 12 .09 $90,099 1994 946 128 136 123 .13 $1,408,118 1995 1,221 220 187 178 .18 $2,762,197 1996 864 101 149 132 .12 $2,188,488 1997 840 89 106 98 .10 $2,394,496 1998 811 96 95 81 .12 $3,341,741 1999 712 93 90 80 .13 $3,719,341 2000 609 114 93 88 .19 $5,637,040 Total 6,119 852 867 792 .14 $21,541,520

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Statistics provided by Equibase Company LLC

Elite Group

The 11 jockeys who have won titles at the major meets at Hollywood Park and Santa Anita since 1970:

Jockey Titles

Laffit Pincay 25

Chris McCarron 9

Gary Stevens 6

Alex Solis 6

Kent Desormeaux 5

Sandy Hawley 3

Corey Nakatani 3

Darrel McHargue 1

Eddie Delahoussaye 1

Pat Valenzuela 1

David Flores 1